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ceebeegeeLionel Richie is still pretty damn hot. Puffy cheeks and all.
I've been thinking a lot about the South this week, triggered by rediscovering Parade and being inspired to do some Internet research on the Leo Frank lynching. I even found a .pdf document that shows a handwritten list of many of the known participants--as far as I can tell, none of my relatives were involved, thank God. (No Hixes, anyway. But then my mother's family has always intermarried with Jews.) I was thinking about the exchange on the OTB board where I was trying to explain Southern culture to moppet. I could have said--the South is a product of the Romantic area, rather than the Rational one. At Sweet Briar we had the honor code, basically a more flowery version of "I will not lie, cheat or steal." We had to memorize it--during orientation we had to write it down word for word, comma for comma. And this made it possible for us to have unproctored exams and even take home exams, because the administrators had faith in the integrity of our word. Honor was a living, relevant, meaningful concept to them and us. And colleges all over the South have honor codes--I know UVa does, as well as W&L and VMI.
I can't remember if they had one at Mount Holyoke or not. If they did, it still wasn't drilled into us the way it was at Sweet Briar, where it was posted in every classroom, and where we had to sign "I pledge..." to every test and paper.
God, I miss the South sometimes. As dark and terrible as its history is, it's still so beautiful. Warm, wet nights and magnolia trees outside my dorm window, filling the room with a sweet smell and trains going by in the distance...
I've been thinking a lot about the South this week, triggered by rediscovering Parade and being inspired to do some Internet research on the Leo Frank lynching. I even found a .pdf document that shows a handwritten list of many of the known participants--as far as I can tell, none of my relatives were involved, thank God. (No Hixes, anyway. But then my mother's family has always intermarried with Jews.) I was thinking about the exchange on the OTB board where I was trying to explain Southern culture to moppet. I could have said--the South is a product of the Romantic area, rather than the Rational one. At Sweet Briar we had the honor code, basically a more flowery version of "I will not lie, cheat or steal." We had to memorize it--during orientation we had to write it down word for word, comma for comma. And this made it possible for us to have unproctored exams and even take home exams, because the administrators had faith in the integrity of our word. Honor was a living, relevant, meaningful concept to them and us. And colleges all over the South have honor codes--I know UVa does, as well as W&L and VMI.
I can't remember if they had one at Mount Holyoke or not. If they did, it still wasn't drilled into us the way it was at Sweet Briar, where it was posted in every classroom, and where we had to sign "I pledge..." to every test and paper.
God, I miss the South sometimes. As dark and terrible as its history is, it's still so beautiful. Warm, wet nights and magnolia trees outside my dorm window, filling the room with a sweet smell and trains going by in the distance...
